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Lowell health center frets funding deadline

Susan West-Levine, CEO of the Lowell Community Health Center, says $3 million is at stake if Congress doesn t act before the year is over. SUN FILE PHOTO

LOWELL -- The clock struck midnight over the weekend on Congress' apparent deadline to reauthorize funding for community health centers, causing a bit of uncertainty for leaders of area facilities.

Lowell Community Health Center CEO Susan West Levine emphasized on Monday that Congress must address this critical funding by December before the new grant cycle begins in January.

Lowell's center could lose close to $3 million -- about 6 percent of its operating budget -- if no action is taken, according to Levine.

"We still need to get Congress' attention to make sure it doesn't get past December," said Levine, who last week traveled to Washington, D.C. to advocate for health centers. "Anything later than that would be concerning from a cash-flow perspective."

She remains optimistic that the funding will be reauthorized, pointing to the bipartisan support behind health centers.

"We were hoping this wouldn't happen, but I anticipated it could because of the many important and pressing matters facing Congress," she said.

"While we can manage a delay until December, I don't know if we'll see a situation where new doctors and clinicians fear to sign on with us," Levine added. "I've heard from other health centers that some doctors have been hesitant to sign on because of the uncertainty."

Advocates last week sounded the alarm over critical funding for community health centers, which expired on Saturday, the last day of September.

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Congress failed to reach agreement on a fix, meaning health centers in Massachusetts could lose about $196 million in funding and more than 141,000 state residents could be affected.

Fitchburg's community health center would also be impacted, losing around $3.4 million in federal funding, which is about 15 percent of its operating budget.

John DeMalia, the president and CEO of Community Health Connections in Fitchburg, said there's "uncertainty" after no action was taken this weekend.

Like Levine, he's hoping that Congress reauthorizes the funding by the end of December. Fitchburg's grant funding cycle is through the end of March; it's different for every community health center.

"We ask for the community to reach out to Congress, to their reps and senators, and really explain to them the importance of what this does to their community," DeMalia said. "This loss of funding would be devastating."

Across Massachusetts and the country, the cuts would have a significant impact on health centers' financial operations, severely limiting their ability to recruit and retain staff. According to the federal Department of Human Services, 50,000 staff positions -- including physicians and nurses -- could be eliminated and 2,800 health center locations forced to shut their doors.

According to the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers, these centers support about 12,000 jobs across Massachusetts and generate close to $1 billion in annual health-care savings for the state. Health centers provide primary care to one-out-of-every-seven state residents -- or nearly 1 million people.

Lowell Community Health Center serves as the "family doctor" for nearly half of the city's population.

"A couple of patients last week were nervous we were going to close, so we need to ease concerns of community members," Levine said. "We'll be here for the community.

"I will definitely make sure we have plans in place should this funding not come through," she added.

A growing number of Republicans and Democrats in both the Senate and House have urged their colleagues to take immediate action on the funding cliff.

Senators Elizabeth Warren and Edward Markey joined 68 of their colleagues in signing a letter, urging leaders of the Senate Committee on Health Education, Labor and Pensions to resolve this funding cliff.

The Senate letter came on the heels of bipartisan legislation, "The Community Health Investment, Modernization and Excellence (CHIME) Act of 2017," introduced in the House. The legislation would extend the Community Health Centers Fund for an additional five years.

Speaking to reporters Monday, Gov. Charlie Baker said community health centers and the Children's Health Insurance Program are programs that people "really depend on."

"The CHIP program, which has been really important to Massachusetts -- and we were one of the first states to adopt it and chase it hard -- has not been reauthorized... That worries me," Baker said after speaking at a health costs hearing. "And they also did not reauthorize the community health center program. So while a lack of action on some of the issues around ACA reform may have been good news, there's a whole bunch of other things where a lack of action creates real issues for everybody and in a very immediate term."

Information from the State House News Service was used in this report.

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